Two Weeks Til Santa Cruz

Hello again!

So I somehow got a summer job in Santa Cruz, CA! I'm going to refer to it as a 'job' even though I will be getting paid next to nothing. Big thanks to the US government for taking advantage of thousands of broke, desperate college grads. As Claudio would say, Ces't la vie!

The position runs from March 10 to September 10. It's basically going to be like the Iowa DNR parks job I had a couple summers ago, except in CA, so at least 100X better. Here's the job description:

https://my.americorps.gov/mp/listing/viewListing.do?id=47053&applicationSubmissionID=1343296&nsaID=611424

It's pretty much the lowest starting point for any graduate in the wildlife or natural resources field. But I'm okay with that. Need to 'work my way up the ladder' and 'beggars can't be choosers' and all that stuff that's supposed to give me hope for the future!

My little sister, Krista will be driving with me out to Santa Cruz come March 1st. We are going to make a few stops along the way to visit some dear friends and our dear cousins. Other than that, I haven't planned a thing, and I'm very excited for the next six months, AND BEYOND!

I will also try to post more than once a month, this time around :)

Is anybody out there?

Larry-I miss you!

Weather Lesson

Four Seasons of Alaska:

Beginning of Winter
Winter
End of Winter
Summer

Today there was a high of 25 F. I'm not complaining I'm just surprised that it's still so chilly in April!! There's also a lottt of snow on the ground yet. Needless to say I'm very excited to see the last season listed.

April

SOo I almost forgot about this blog (I did) for a while. But we're back in action. I haven't been doing that much...school is keeping me so busy, and I'm only taking 14 credits! What the heck. Pretty much just have one ridiculous class that I spend 80% of my waking hours on (ahem Plant Physiology).

The weather is finally getting warmer here!! And the snow is melting too, it's quite messy. Today it was up to 45 F. And the days are long, over 13 hours of daylight, sun comes up around 7 and sets around 9. Last night I had a dream about having like 22 hours of daylight (how it will be in the summer) and I have a feeling it's gonna be crazy!!! It will be so cool, you could go running at like 11 pm, or do anything outside, so many more options.

So, last week I saved a bird! I found a Common Redpoll (I'm an ornithology master now) outside the Arctic Health building (where I hang out mostly every day) and he had apparently flew into the window, he was not looking good. I was kinda freakin out because I didn't want to just leave him, but didn't really know what to do. And I thought if I picked him up he might peck my eye or something. So I called my ornithology professor and he told me to pick him up and just give him a 'boost,' birds run into windows a lot (they're smart?) and they just get shook up, but are usually okay. So I picked him up for a few minutes..it was so cool he just perched right on my finger and wasn't even scared of me!! After a few minutes he flew to a nearby tree, but I treasure our short time together.

My friend.

Some exciting news- I have an interview TOMORROW with the Alaska Dept. of Fish and Game!!! I'm soo excited about it! I got a call on Friday about it, had been waiting almost a month to hear back since applying. It would be in southwest AK, basically my dream internship: camping all summer, sampling salmon, playing on rivers, driving boats, not showering, etc. etc. So we'll see how that goes.

Also got a callback about an Americorp internship in Iowa. So I'm gonna see what's up with that, but it's not as cool as the previous one.

I have two tests this week so I need to get studying! ADIOS AMIGOS!

MOOSE

I saw my first moose last Friday. Bout time right?! If I had a dime for every dead deer I've seen on highway 20 I'd be rich. Moose are slightly more scarce I guess.

My friend Karolina and I just stepped outside of our dorm for some fresh air, and this young moose was munching on a tree right across the street!!! It was super close.

Angie and Moose. Taken from Karolina's phone of course.

Within like 15 minutes a bunch of people were ogling at poor guy and campus police came and were like "okay just be calm don't feed it blah blah," duh. It was funny. Eventually he ran back into the woods, but it made for an eventful twenty minutes or so.

Da Northern Lights

...not only a delicious drink at Caribou Coffee, but so much more.

So early in March there was some kind of solar flare or something, I'm too lazy to look up the deets, but basically the auroras were NUTS for a couple days later, around March 8-10. My friend Antonia and I went to Murphy Dome, the top of a big hill basically, to try and catch the action. I borrowed a camera to try and take pics but I had never used a digital SLR before, those thangs are complicated. So I'll showcase a terrible picture I took and steal some from my friends.

By me. EHH. If you can't see the green line, tilt your screen.

This was the night before I went out. By David Broome.

Also by my friend David, he has a knack for this.

The auroras are beautiful. I have learned about why they appear but I still don't really understand the mechanism. They are wonderful to watch while stumbling home from the Marlin at night :)

Anchorage

This past weekend I went on a trip to Anchorage with my friend Kristen, her boyfriend, and some other people. I always thought that Fairbanks and Anchorage looked 'close' on a map, but maps of Alaska are misleading, this place is too big!!! It was about a 7 hour drive each way, but it wasn't that bad (when the sun was up) because the views are so amazing! Also saw a moose and two bald eagles on the drive, wooo!

Anchorage is the biggest city in AK (it's not big) and it's surrounded by huge snowy mountains, and there's also bay areas on the south side. It's way more pretty than Fairbanks. Weather is a bit warmer too for some reason. We stopped for a few photo ops along the highway, and noticed that you could see the low tide taking along all the ice chunks if you look closely, it was pretty cool.

Along the highway

We arrived late on Friday night, and on Saturday went skiing at Alyeska Ski Resort which is AWESOME. Hands down best place I've ever skiied (sorry Breckenridge). You literally are at the top of a mountain that's a mile high and you can see the ocean and all the surrounding mountains...it's so beautiful. And it's just a great facility, tons of lifts and stuff, and the runs are crazeeyyy steep, I was scared at first. The weather was great which made it even more fun.

I lost a screw in my binding and randomly met a rental tech from DUBUQUE to fix it. Small world huh.

Alyeska (phone pic)

After snowboarding all day, we just hung out at the house, Kristen's friend Kaley made us dinner. I ATE CARIBOU!!!!! Two bites to be exact. It was really good, but I didn't want to get a stomach ache. It tasted like deer. I've noticed a lot people up here eat wild game, people in IA do a lot too, but hardly at all in the college population (it seems like). Anyway I like being able to enjoy a little protein from a humanely harvested animal that lived a free and wonderful life (commercial farming is the devil) okay I'm done trying to brainwash you. I have eaten salmon and caribou now, I still need to try moose!!